Back of the Envelope

The brutal beheading of Nicholas Berg was supposedly in retaliation for the prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib. The fact that the terrorists blamed the Abu Ghraib atrocities for Nick Berg's beheading tells us more about the media-savviness of the terrorists than their motivation. Nicholas Berg was kidnapped two weeks before the scandal broke. The circumstances were odd, as you'll notice if you read the first article. He clearly wasn't kidnapped because of the prisoner abuse. He may have been taken because he was more vulnerable, since he wasn't attached to the military or the CPA. There may have been some other reason. Once he was taken, his odds of survival were slim.